Travel Journal 2024

What a day!

It actually started out pretty harmlessly. We left Yokohama and headed to our next stop, Okayama. Our goal for today was the Washuzan observation deck, from where you get a fantastic view of the 60 km long Shimanami Kaidō bridge, which connects the main island of Honshu with the island of Shikoku. Unfortunately, the observation deck is a bit hard to reach. Buses only run hourly, take a massive detour, and don’t stop anywhere near it. You’re actually quicker walking there if you’re good on your feet. Which we are.

The walk there started in light rain; we brought rain gear with us. And the view lived up to its promise, even in the dreary weather. Then we made our way back, on foot again of course, because the bus stop was far away and the bus rarely came.

But the rain kept getting heavier, and in the end, it was bucketing down. We had no choice but to finish the walk to the station. We finally arrived there soaked to the bone.

We’ll spend the rest of the evening trying to dry our stuff somehow. We also need to plan out tomorrow. Right now, Typhoon number 21 (also called Kong-rey) is on its way to Japan, which is very unusual for November. It promises to bring even more rain, so we might have to just have a hotel day.

It remains exciting, but we’re in good spirits on this adventure!

The day started early for us. At 5 in the morning, a lonely siren wailed outside. It led to us and a few other worried hotel guests standing at the reception ten minutes later, asking what it meant. The night porter simply told us that we didn’t need to worry. Oh well… 🤔

Typhoon number 21 had weakened to a tropical depression, but still brought plenty of heavy rain across the whole country and really messed up the timetable for the Shinkansen bullet trains. In some cases, there were delays of over four hours!

We decided to spend the morning in the hotel room so we wouldn’t get soaked to the bone yet again. In the afternoon, a Shinkansen delayed by 70 minutes (so, on time by German standards) then took us to our next place to stay: Fukuyama. The sun even came out there, as if nothing had happened, and let us get a first impression of the city and especially its beautiful castle.

Today we visited Shinshōji, a Buddhist temple. It is located near Fukuyama and can be reached by a journey of just under thirty minutes on the bus through rural suburbs. The complex was built in 1965 and is therefore relatively new, which can easily be seen from the main hall made of exposed concrete.

It includes a rather large park where you can go for a walk, meditate, and find your inner balance again. If you wish, you can experience Zen for yourself there for a day. Guided by a monk, you start with breakfast, then move on to the meditative copying of sutras, followed by a tea ceremony. For us, the simple Zen we experienced while taking easily around two hundred photos in the park, surrounded by splashing water and chirping birds, was quite enough. 😁

Tomorrow we are off to our next stop: Fukuoka.

The hotel here in Fukuoka is already prepped for Christmas.

Before we continued our journey to Fukuoka on the Shinkansen bullet train, we enjoyed our stay in Fukuyama. Yesterday evening, we went for a photo walk around the castle.

This morning we had some time to kill and visited a few temples and shrines on the off-chance. We particularly liked the Hachimangu shrine, which was surprisingly large and magnificently decorated. Today, however, there was a festival taking place there, possibly an early Shichi-Go-San celebrating the health of little children. The boys and girls were gorgeously dressed up in colourful kimonos, accompanied by their proud parents and grandparents as well as photographers capturing the event. Of course, we didn’t take any photos here, even though we would have loved to.

At Hakata station, the first wave of Christmas washed over us. A huge, colourfully flickering Christmas tree and festive illuminations lit up the forecourt. There were stalls with loads of “typically German” Christmas items (like mulled wine, beer, candles or… erm… spice bundles). Live singers were belting out American Christmas carols on a stage. All this at a daytime temperature that felt like 25°C. And people say we get gingerbread in the supermarkets too early back home. 😉